There's a group of women that the clothing industry is ignoring — and it's costing them tons of money

There's a category of women that often fly under the radar in the
modeling and clothing industries.

In a recent story, Racked points out that these women are not
truly plus size, but they're not thin (or a sample size), either.
Oddly, Racked notes, there's plenty of women who actually look
like middle-sized women — they're not curvy supermodels and
they're not waifs.

They're often told they have to pick a side, or lose weight to
have a career.

Model Jennie Runk was told if she wanted to
be a model she'd have to lose weight — though she ultimately
decided to accept her body type and be a plus size model.

Aerie's spokes model Iskra Lawrence told
Business Insider how she was dropped from an agency for being
"too big" — but since embracing her curves, she's become a poster
woman for body positivity.

For whatever reason, though, the media doesn't seem to want to
see depictions of reality. They only want to see what they
believe are the two types of female bodies that exist — when,
obviously, there are many.

To illustrate this, Racked points to a humorous anecdote
from Mindy Kaling's book, "Is Everybody Hanging out With
Me:"

"Since I am not model-skinny, but also not super-fat and
fabulously owning my hugeness, I fall into that nebulous, ‘Normal
American Woman Size’ that legions of fashion stylists detest. For
the record, I'm a size 8 (this week, anyway). Many stylists hate
that size because, I think, to them, I lack the self-discipline
to be an aesthetic, or the sassy confidence to be a total fatty
hedonist. They're like, ‘Pick a lane.'"

And when a curvy model who's on the smaller side of the spectrum
is touted as a "plus" size model, there's often lots of backlash
— in part, because it's not an accurate representation of what
"plus size" really is, and also, because it suggests that there's
a need to lump women into a category, that simply having a body
isn't enough.

And when Calvin Klein featured model Maya Dalbesio in a
campaign in 2014, people were furious. Though the company said
she was a size 10, New York Magazine noted she was a closer to
an 8. Either way, people weren't happy to see that she was being
grouped in the "plus" category. If the average American woman is a size 14, then
that would make her below average.

Popular Gen Z model (and Kylie Jenner's best friend) Jordyn Woods
has said that people above size eight can get lumped into the
plus size category, simply because there's a need to justify why
someone who isn't waif-like.

"Well, I believe that once you're past a size 8, you're
considered plus-size. Everyone has different body shapes,
heights," she recently said to The Cut. "It's unfortunate because sometimes
a curvy girl will say, "I'm a model," and people will look at her
sideways. Then she'll have to say, "I'm a plus-size model."
That's just society, you know? Hopefully, if we
stop using the term plus-size we can just create a broader
definition for what a model is," she said.

All of this translates to the industry: there's a clear
segmentation between 'plus' and 'straight size,' It creates
a mentality that there are two camps of women, rather than a
seamless blur between how human bodies can differentiate from one
another.

In turn, this can turn off plus size, women too — a foolish thing
to do, considering that according to industry research
firm NPD Group (via Bloomberg), it's a $20.4 billion category.

And experts believe that it would behoove retailers to include
more sizes — including plus sizes — in their imagery, too,
because it could pay off...literally (which should be
particularly enticing considering how many people aren't spending money on apparel
nowadays).